Volunteer Recognition, Volunteer Management and Volunteer Recognition Even More Great Ideas for You!

Ultimate Ideas Newsletter

How to lead, recruit and retain more volunteers and members!

Issue 23

Volunteer Management Workshops - A Special Thanks

'The Good, The Bad and The Ugly' Intensive Workshop was a 'full on', high content and high energy event and we always aim to keep adding more ideas for you and 'raising the standard'. Here's some feedback we received after the tour...

I would like to take the opportunity to tell you how much I did enjoy your workshop and found it of the highest benefit. I am not just saying this, but delivering an honest opinion, when I say you would have to be the most dynamic presenter I have come across (and I have seen many in my years!). You are fun, genuine, get the message across, and really engage all of your audience. You are an amazing woman and truly inspire me on many levels.......forget Angelina Jolie and give me DR JUDY ESMOND any day! Warmest regards

Julie Bronson
A/Volunteer Admin Co-ordinator for (SAFECOM) Volunteer Management Branch, South Australia

Welcome back home Judy! Just a few words of thanks for the 'The Good, The Bad and The Ugly' Workshop!  you presented here in Melbourne... I left not only having many of my views strongly reinforced, but I also learnt many, many new things. I can honestly say that at the 'The Good, The Bad and The Ugly' Workshop - it was the best and most informative workshop I have attended!  (It was also a load of fun as well) I say this not just from a volunteering prospective but also from a personal development angle as well! Thanks Judy, it was awesome!

Glynn Jarrett
Volunteer Support Officer, Community & Cultural Development, City of Greater Bendigo

Now let's give you a taste of a few ideas from the workshop series and a great reminder for those who were there...

Web Page Attraction, The Headlines Quiz and A Great Content Idea for  Your Volunteer Recruitment

Web Pages

Your website content is useless

We've certainly talked a lot in previous volunteer management newsletters about the importance of headlines in your brochures and flyers. But what about on your website and those web pages dedicated to volunteering and volunteer recruitment? Well, the same rules apply. Understand that your content is useless if you cannot get people's attention and it's the headline that attracts attention. It is certainly not the latest web-based 'bells and whistles' either - it's still the headline that is the most important in getting their attention. When they are surfing the web, looking at all those volunteering opportunities on all those websites, you have only nanoseconds to attract their attention or one click and they are gone!

Let's take this web page as an example

Let's look at this web page as an example. Yes, there's certainly lots of areas for improvement and we've deliberately not started with a headline to illustrate the example! Now, look at the feedback near the start from Julie Bronson about 'The Good, The Bad and The Ugly' Workshop - did you read it? Maybe. But what if we took the same feedback and had added a headline at the top, such as one of the examples below. Would these get your attention now...

Move Over Angelina Jolie There's A New Star in Town!

or

Angelina Jolie - Has Her Star Quality Really Faded?

Take the Headlines Quick Quiz - Can you guess which headlines worked best?  

So how do you know what headlines to use in your volunteer recruitment and marketing material on your web pages? Well there is one great secret behind any headlines that we've really not discussed in-depth in these newsletters. But before revealing the secret, let's do a short 'Headlines Quiz'...

This is adapted from the work of marketing expert Jay Abraham*. These are headlines in advertising material in newspapers and it is the same for web pages. In each case the content of the advertisement remained unchanged, only the headline was changed and the results are based solely on what headline got more attention resulting in more sales. Which headline do you think produced the better results and therefore, more sales?

Headline Question No 1

This headline was for an Insurance Income Protection Plan.

Headline A - What would become of your wife if something happened to you?

Headline B - Retirement income plan.

So, do you vote for Headline A or Headline B to have been the most effective? Don't look for the answers yet - just write down your vote - A or B?

Headline Question No 2

This was an advertisement for an English Course.

Headline A - The man who simplified English.

Headline B - Do you make these mistakes in English?

Vote for Headline A or Headline B to have been the most effective in terms of sales.

Headline Question No 3

This headline was for Car Insurance.

Headline A - Auto Insurance at lower rates if you are a careful driver.

Headline B - How to turn your careful driving into money.

Vote for Headline A or Headline B to have been the most effective.

The Secret to Headlines is...

Now before revealing the secret to your headlines, let's give you the results...

Headline Question No 1 - Headline B resulted in 500% more sales than Headline A

Headline Question No 2 - Headline B resulted in 3 times more sales than Headline A

Headline Question No 3 - Headline A was 1200% more effective than Headline B

Whether you got the quiz questions right or wrong - this is not the secret. The secret to any headlines is to TEST them. Don't spend too long analyzing the answers above - test your headlines. Whenever you make assumptions about what headlines work - you may find you are entirely wrong. Test your headlines and see what happens in your volunteer recruiting success.

Use the web to test your volunteering headlines

The web is a great place to test your volunteering headlines as it costs next to nothing to do so. Here's an idea to get you started with the help of your web master, if needed. Take your web page with exactly the same content on volunteering, but create two different headlines. For one month, use one headline and the next month use another headline. Record how many people 'clicked through' to contacting you via email or completed your enquiry form about volunteering. If everything else is equal - same content, similar time of year, similar amount of traffic (people visiting your website), etc and the only change is the headlines - then that will tell you what headline is working better for you on your web page. Do this periodically, testing new headlines as you go. You will find that certain headlines will always outperform others and it is seldom what you actually think would work!

Now there are many other aspects to 'web analytics' and programs that you can use to test and measure everything about your web pages, but that's entirely another workshop on 'web marketing' and we just wanted to get you thinking about this aspect of your web page attraction. Start with this simple test and you will be amazed at what a difference a headline can make in your volunteer recruitment success.

Use the best web page headlines in your volunteering flyers

Now take this idea and transpose it to your hard-copy volunteer recruitment material. Test numerous headlines on your web pages for virtually no cost before you produce those glossy flyers and brochures. Then take the best headlines from your web page testing and use these on your brochures and flyers. Generally, if a headline works well on your web page, it will work well on your brochures and flyers. It's certainly one of the cheapest ways of testing headlines!

A great website idea on content for you in volunteer management

So you're going to start testing your headlines to find out what headlines work better than others. But what about your web page content? Let's give you one quick idea to make your content really worth reading. Are you in the same demographic group, the same age group or the same target market as those people you are trying to attract as volunteers? If yes, then write your content as if you were secretly writing it to recruit YOU! Write what you would want to read as a potential volunteer. This will make your content more compelling, more appealing and more effective. 

But if you are not in that target market, if you are looking for young people and you are much older - then it will not work as it's a different market. You then have to ask those in that target market - that demographic group of young people about what content would attract them.

The power of a quiz

But before you go! One more idea on content for you. Did you notice something that generally kept your attention in this newsletter (besides the compelling content)? Perhaps, it was the quiz itself. In your website marketing material and also in your newsletters - short quizzes can be a great way of getting people's attention to read on.

Now one final Headline quiz question for you...

This headline was for a Correspondence Course.

Headline A - Announcing a new course for men seeking independence in the next three years.

Headline B - An up to the minute course to meet today's problems.

So, do you vote for Headline A or Headline B to have been the most effective?

The answer will be in the next 'quick read' email idea for you coming soon.

* Jay Abraham's Book is entitled "Getting Everything You Can Out Of All You've Got"

Enjoy!

Judy

Dr Judy Esmond is a leading international expert on how to gain, sustain and retain volunteers and members. Join up and receive FREE membership to her 'Ultimate Ideas' Mastermind Group and get a great FREE E-Book and newsletter filled with 100s of ideas on volunteer management, volunteer recruitment, retention and volunteer recognition at http://www.morevolunteers.com

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